by Mark Anthony
At this, Melia halted, then moved back a half step and nodded in return, her amber eyes filled with an expression that seemed almost … sad. A pang of regret filled Lirith’s chest.
She concealed the awkwardness of the moment with a question. “Where is the queen?”
“I fear you are too late, my lady,” Durge said.
Aryn frowned at the knight. “Ivalaine hasn’t passed away, Durge. She’s only at breakfast.”
“We were about to find some breakfast ourselves,” Falken said, slinging the battered wooden case that held his lute over his shoulder. “Will you join us, Lirith?”
She nodded, then took his arm when he proffered it.
“Falken,” Aryn said as they moved toward a side door, “you still haven’t told us why you’ve come to Ar-tolor. I thought you were going to travel for a while with Tome.”
The bard shrugged. “Tome decided he’d rather rest. But then, he is over two thousand years old, so we didn’t argue the point. Besides, when we heard a High Coven was being called, we decided to come here instead.”
Lirith froze. “But Queen Ivalaine has only just called for the coven.”
“Yes, dear,” Melia said. “We know.”
Once again Lirith studied the amber-eyed woman. While no longer truly a goddess, Melia’s powers were still mysterious and vast. The Witches had always respected her … but they were wary of her as well. Melia was of the new religions of Tarras, not the ancient worship of Sia.
Then again, it seems that those who shun the name Sia rise most quickly among the Witches these days, is that not so Sister Lirith?
The furrows in Durge’s brow deepened. “I have not heard of this High Coven. What is it?”
Lirith opened her mouth, wondering what she should tell the knight, but before she could speak, another voice—cracked and high-pitched—answered for her.
“My good, glum knight, don’t you know?
It’s where sewers spin and spinners sew.
Weaving secrets to and fro—
So let’s to the High Coven go.”
By the time Lirith caught a flash of green and yellow, he was already scrambling down a tapestry like a great, gangly spider. He must have been hiding up among the beams of the hall, listening to everything they said.
“Begone with you,” Durge rumbled, his hand moving to the knife at his hip as the fool scuttled toward them.
Falken laid a hand on Durge’s arm. “No, he was king in this hall once. Let him stay.”
Tharkis spread bony arms and bowed, the bells of his cap jangling dissonantly. “No wish to bother, no wish to harm. A poem I would speak, our great guests to charm.”
Durge did not look like he was in the mood for poems. “Speak it, knave, and then away with you.”
Tharkis bowed so low his pointed boots touched his brow. However, the moment Durge glanced away, the fool performed a caper, miming with uncanny verisimilitude the act of drawing a sword and falling upon it. Lirith swallowed a giggle, and Aryn clamped a hand to her mouth.
Durge snapped back around. “Whatever your history may be, Fool, your antics are not appreciated here.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Melia said, moving past the glowering Embarran. “I believe I rather like him. Speak your poem for us, Master Tharkis. Please.”
The fool leaped to his feet, then spoke shrill words in a fractured rhyme:
“The wolf said to the moon one day,
‘I think I can no longer stay
Upon this path so long I’ve run—
It always ends where it’s begun.’
“The moon said to the wolf one night,
‘Come with me, and we’ll take flight.
We’ll eat of suns and drink of stars—
All we’ve dreamed will here be ours.’
“But though as much as he did try,
The wolf could never leap so high.
Nor could the moon descend so deep—
I’ve heard it said they both yet weep.”
Throughout the verse, the smile on Melia’s face gradually faded. When Tharkis finished speaking, she looked away. Falken glanced at her and sighed. Lirith didn’t understand why, but the poem had seemed to sadden the two.
“Your rhyme makes for a poor welcome, Fool,” she said.
“Did I say welcome?” A sly gleam entered Tharkis’s crossed eyes. “Perhaps I meant farewell. One’s so like the other, it’s often hard to tell.”
“Or perhaps you’re simply a bad poet,” Aryn said. “After all, I bested you once.”
Tharkis scurried toward the baroness, his rubbery limbs tangling and untangling as he moved. “But we have not finished our game yet, my sweet. I’ll speak you your poem when next we do meet.”
Before Aryn could reply, the fool sprang backward in a series of flips. Then, with a chiming of bells, he scampered through a door and was gone.
There was a long silence, broken when Durge cleared his throat.
“I have been thinking,” the knight said seemingly to no one in particular. “Lord Falken and Lady Melia can offer both better company and better protection than I. Perhaps now that they are here it is time I return to Stonebreak. It has been long since I have seen personally to the affairs of my manor.”
Aryn’s blue eyes went wide. “Oh, Durge, you mustn’t even make a jest of leaving!” She rushed forward and grasped his left hand with hers. “I am certain your reeve can look after your manor well enough. Please—you must promise me that you will stay with us.”
The Embarran hesitated, then nodded, clasping rough fingers around her smooth hand for a moment. “As you wish, my lady.”
Aryn beamed, but Durge’s careworn face appeared more deeply lined than ever. Lirith didn’t need to steal his thoughts as she had in the Barrens to know that this gesture had cost him. Lirith wished she had never learned of the knight’s feelings for Aryn. And sometimes she wished she could tell the young woman. Perhaps there was a chance.…
But no, that was foolish. Durge was over twice Aryn’s age. And while such marriages happened often enough, they were arranged for land, money, and alliance, not for love. Durge would never make his feelings plain to Aryn. And Lirith had sworn she would never tell.
Yet it was more than this that seemed to weigh on him; Durge seemed grimmer than ever today. Had something happened to him? Or was it that, after the tangle she had glimpsed that morning, nothing seemed quite right.
“Come on,” Falken said. “The queen granted us her hospitality, and I’m ready to take advantage of it. Let’s get breakfast.”
7.
The next day, witches began to arrive at Ar-tolor.
Aryn first suspected something was happening as she sat in her chamber, taking breakfast. A tingling danced along her spine, and—compelled for a reason she could not name—she set down her spoon, rose, and moved to the window. In the bailey below, a rider clad in a green cloak and hood sat upon a black horse. A guardsman reached out to help the rider dismount, but instead the traveler looked up and the hood slipped back, revealing a cascade of gold hair. The rider was a woman past her middle years, but still possessed of a powerful beauty.
Evidently the guardsman was as surprised as Aryn, for he stepped back. The woman on the horse turned her head, as if searching. Then her gaze locked on the window through which Aryn watched, and a smile touched her lips. For a moment Aryn gazed into sea-green eyes. Then, with a gasp, she hurried from the window. It seemed like the woman in the bailey had seen her watching. But that was impossible.
After breakfast, Aryn went in search of Lady Tressa, for there was much to do before the dark of the moon and the start of the coven, which—from what scant knowledge Aryn had been able to glean—was to span four days. She was near the entry gallery of the castle when she caught a scent like nightflowers. This was odd not because it was midday, but because for all its beauty—and like all castles Aryn had ever been in—Ar-tolor smelled more like a privy than a garden. She turned in time to see a tall, slender figur
e all in black vanish between two columns. Aryn hurried after but found nothing save a scattering of white, fragrant petals upon the stone floor.
It was after midday when Aryn finally finished counting all the candles stored in the castle’s cellar. It seemed an odd task, but that was what Tressa had bid her do and so she had. Aryn walked down a corridor, trying her best to brush the dust and spiderwebs from her gown. Working in the cellar had been grimier than she had imagined.
“Mind if I have some of that cobweb, deary?”
Aryn looked up to see an ancient woman clad in a shapeless brown frock. There was little hair left on the woman’s knobby head, but her blue eyes were bright in her wrinkled face.
Aryn shrugged. “No, not at all. Here you are.” She handed the other a gauzy, gray ball.
The old woman gave a cackle—she was quite toothless—and spirited the cobweb into a pocket. “Thank you, deary.” She hobbled past.
After several steps, Aryn stopped and blinked. She glanced back over her shoulder, but the old woman was already out of sight. Aryn turned and hurried to Lirith’s chamber. She found the dark-eyed woman inside, grinding something with mortar and pestle. It smelled fresh but bitter.
“Something peculiar is going on in this castle,” Aryn said, shutting the door behind her.
Lirith did not look up from her work, but she smiled mysteriously. “Five witches have arrived since dawn, last I spoke to Tressa.”
“I knew it!” Aryn flopped into a chair. “I knew they had to be witches. Each of them was strange in her own way.” A thought occurred to her. “But how can they be arriving at the castle when Ivalaine only announced the High Coven last night?”
“You mean she only told us about the High Coven last night. For all we know, she might have sent out messages weeks ago.”
A thrill coursed through Aryn, and she sat up straight in the chair. “Yes, but what sort of messages?”
Lirith crumbled a few dried leaves into the mortar and said nothing. That was answer enough for Aryn. Ivalaine had sent out a message about the coven, but not one written with ink on paper. And perhaps that was why Melia and Falken were here; perhaps Lady Melia had overheard.
Then why didn’t you hear it, Aryn? Or Lirith?
But maybe the message had not been intended for them. And Aryn’s ability to speak across the Weirding was limited at best, although she certainly intended to improve. And Lirith was going to help her whether she wanted to or not.
A sigh caught Aryn’s attention. The pestle lay motionless in Lirith’s hand; the witch stared into space.
“Are you well, sister?” Aryn said, excitement replaced by concern.
Lirith smiled, but the expression seemed fragile somehow. “Lady Tressa is looking for you. I believe she has another task for you to start.”
Those next days passed swiftly. As it turned out, Lady Tressa had many more tasks for both of them before the coven began. They helped to air out dozens of the castle’s spare chambers, and they spent long afternoons venturing into the groves that dotted the land near Ar-tolor, searching for goldleaf, moonbell, and other herbs Tressa bade them find—all of which could be ground into a heady incense, good for purifying air and clearing vision.
However, there were other tasks that made little sense to Aryn. They burned three candles—one to a stump, one halfway, and one just for a moment—before extinguishing them and wrapping them in red-linen cloths. They drew water from the castle well in the blackest hour of the night, although Aryn could hardly see how it would differ from water drawn in daylight. Wet was wet. As she discovered when, in her bleariness, she spilled a chill bucket on herself.
“At least that woke you up,” Lirith said with a laugh, then lowered the bucket back into the well.
Most inexplicable of all, with the help of Ivalaine’s ladies-in-waiting, Tressa bade them sew three robes. The first was white and woven from the wool of lambs. The second was brilliant green, colored with fresh rushes. And the third was dark as smoke, dyed with ashes. What were the robes for?
Tressa smiled when Aryn asked this. “Why, she has three faces, and so she wears three robes: one for her waking, one for her fullness, and one for her waning.”
“But who is she?” Aryn asked, more perplexed than ever.
Tressa’s smile only deepened.
“All right, Lirith,” Aryn demanded that night at supper in the great hall, speaking low under her breath, for the queen sat only a few places away. “What is this High Coven really all about?”
“You will see,” Lirith said, and took a sip from her wine.
Aryn started to groan—it was a typically enigmatic answer—then her eyes narrowed. “You don’t actually know, do you?”
Lirith did not meet her gaze. “I have … an idea.”
Aryn wasn’t certain what it was: luck, instinct, or some unspoken message translated across the threads of the Weirding. All the same, she knew the word on Lirith’s mind.
“Runebreaker,” she whispered.
Now Lirith did look at her, eyes sharp, face hard. “You will not speak that word again, sister. Not unless it is spoken to you first. Do you understand me?”
Aryn had never heard Lirith speak so harshly before. She gave a jerking nod, then finished her supper in silence.
As the moon waned to a sliver, more witches arrived in Ar-tolor. Some came openly under the bright light of noon, while others drifted into the castle with the purple air of twilight. And sometimes Aryn would awake in the deep of the night, move to her window, and see dim shapes gliding across the bailey, bending heads close in silent speech. Soon the very stones of the keep seemed to echo with whispers, and the castle’s servants and guardsmen walked with the quick-footed nervousness of mice who know a cat’s afoot, looking always over their shoulders.
Finally Aryn counted the days, thinking that if the High Coven did not begin soon she would burst with questions. Some relief did come in her time with Melia and Falken. They told her stories of the great lost kingdom of Malachor, and of the city of Tarras when it was still the shining heart of a vast empire. But though interesting, the stories were only diversions. It was not the past that interested Aryn, but what was to happen in mere days.
It was the morning of the day the High Coven was to begin that she woke to find the Mournish had left Artolor. Sometime during the night they had folded up bright awnings, packed their fantastic wagons, and rolled away down the road, wandering to their next destination.
After breakfast—which Aryn could barely swallow for her excitement—she and Lirith walked down to the commons below the castle, for Tressa had said all was ready for the coven. They walked among tall trees, which swayed back and forth, murmuring a tired song. Summer was passing. Keldath, the gold month, was over. It was Revendath, and the wheat in the field fell before the blades of scythes.
It was easy to make out the yellowed places on the grass where the Mournish wagons had stood. At one of these, Lirith knelt and plucked something from the withered grass. It gleamed in the dappled light: one of the cheap bronze charms the Mournish sold to ward away sickness, to ease pain, or to bring love. This one was shaped like a spider. Aryn wondered what effect it was supposed to have.
“I wish we could have seen them again. The Mournish.”
“It is well we did not,” Lirith said flatly.
Startled, Aryn glanced at her friend. Lirith seemed to gaze into a far-off place.
“What is it, sister?” Aryn said, touching her hand.
Lirith drew a deep breath, then smiled. “It’s nothing. Really.”
Aryn nodded; she thought maybe she understood. The old woman’s words had affected all of them. Once again Aryn thought of the image she had glimpsed in Ivalaine’s ewer and again on the old woman’s card. But what did it mean? Of all the castles Aryn knew, only Ar-tolor had seven towers. And Ivalaine was mistress here.
“We should return to the castle,” Lirith said. “This evening we will have far more on our minds than the Mournish.”
>
Aryn nodded, and they started back the way they had come. But she did not fail to notice that Lirith carefully coiled up the spider necklace and slipped it into the pocket of her gown.
8.
The remainder of that day seemed to drag on for an eternity. Aryn tried to occupy herself with embroidery, but the thread seemed determined to tangle and knot. Lirith had told her the first meeting of the coven would be a welcoming incant, in which all the witches might greet one another. The real work of the High Coven would come in the days that followed. Aryn wasn’t entirely certain when things were to start, but instinct told her it would not be until the sun slipped beneath the horizon, leaving other, deeper powers to steal over the world.
Just as the music of doves drifted through the window, a soft knock came at the door of her chamber. Outside was a woman Aryn had never seen before. She was exceedingly tall and thin, curved like a tree; her brown hair was cropped close to her head in a man’s style. The woman wore a simple robe of light green, and a similar robe hung over her arm.
“It is time,” the woman said before Aryn could speak. She held out the spare robe. “I am Nayla, your guide. Don this, then follow me.”
Minutes later Aryn moved through the dim corridors of Ar-tolor, treading after Nayla along with several more young women. One by one they had gone to the chambers of the others, waited as each donned the spare green robe the witch always seemed able to produce, then continued on their way in silence.
As they walked, Aryn glanced at the young women to either side of her. Most were pale and pretty, while one was dark and lustrous like Lirith. All of them looked lovely in the simple green shifts, their shapely arms left bare by the garments’ half sleeves. Aryn tried to ignore her own withered right arm that flopped out the end of its sleeve. Even as a small girl she remembered being aware of the need to keep her arm concealed. Now that it was in plain view, she felt strangely naked.
A tingle danced across Aryn’s neck. She turned to see one of the young women staring at her. No, not at her, but at her arm. The other quickly looked away, but it was too late; Aryn had seen the horror in her expression. After that, Aryn kept her own gaze fixed rigidly ahead.
